Driving to Work

To get a sense of what Richard Freund has had to do to survive the construction downturn, consider how many miles he's driven in just more than a year.

The GMC Yukon he bought in December 2010 already has 44,000 miles on it. “A lot of window time,” he quips.

But that's what it takes for the owner of Fort Myers-based commercial builder Brooks & Freund to grow the business in tough economic times. The firm's revenues grew 25% in 2011 to $45 million compared with 2010 thanks to geographic diversification.